A Wider Net

Counting eyeballs is on every marketer’s “measurement 101″ curriculum. The eyebox2 from Xuuk (zook) allows you to count people who look at your digital sign. It doesn’t count heads - it counts eyes, and only eyes that are looking at the sign. It is actually a more accurate representation of impressions than a web ad server. Web ad servers cannot tell you if someone looked at an ad - only if they looked at the page.

The device is loaded with invisible light emitters and a tiny camera. The camera can detect light from the emitters reflecting off the back of people’s eyes - similar to flash bulb “red eye”. They must also have some logic in there to tell the difference between different people and people who stand there a long time.

You could, I suppose, use this with advertisers to verify impression counts against a campaign goal. I believe this tool is best used as a method for determining the optimal location of a sign, the optimal types of ads, rotation times, etc. It’s a tweaking tool. And I also imaging that you could use this for applications beyond digital signage. You could use it as a measurement tool at trade shows. Highway officials could use it to determine if that 20mph speed limit sign is sufficiently hidden from view for maximum speeding ticket revenue (I just know they do this somehow already).

I’d like to see this combined with the people-tracking systems offered by Smartvue. That would be one amazing onsite visitor measurement tool.